As always, the word “correlation” is important. It hasn’t been shown that higher intelligence causes someone to be less religious. So, it wouldn’t be right to call someone a dimwit just because of their religious beliefs. Unless, of course, you are an ancient playwright looking to provoke your audience.

The word correlation means that there is a relationship between two things, but the nature isn't known. So A might cause B, B might cause A, C might cause A and B, or, though I'm dubious about this one but A and B could interact somehow to cause each other.

So we don't know that being stupid makes you religious, or that being religious makes you stupid, or that eating lead paint chips causes both.

The reason it isn't right to call someone a dimwit for being religious, besides being douchey, is that the correlation only means that, in the absence of any other information about an individual, they are a bit more likely to have a lower IQ if they are religious. There are going to be many individual exceptions.

People who are intelligent enough don't discard the supernatural "a priori" (i.e. before they even begin).

The ultimate problem with atheism is, how does someone prove that something or somebody (here, God) doesn't exist? Maybe they just haven't been looking at the right places. Maybe they have met God, but they didn't recognize him.

If intelligence only means "thinking only in terms of what one can scientifically measure", that kind of thinking excludes the supernatural, and as such, has no chance of finding it. And if God exists, then for a creature to reject his Creator, it's the ultimate missed opportunity.

To me, intelligence includes the capability to acknowledge someone's own limitations.

I live in a predominantly atheist country, but the general population sure isn't predominantly intelligent. There are still plenty of gullible folks, they just accept other types of voodoo supernatural magic.

People who are intelligent enough don't discard the supernatural "a priori" (i.e. before they even begin).

The ultimate problem with atheism is, how does someone prove that something or somebody (here, God) doesn't exist? Maybe they just haven't been looking at the right places. Maybe they have met God, but they didn't recognize him.

If intelligence only means "people who think only in terms of what they can scientifically measure", that kind of thinking excludes the supernatural, and as such, has no chance of finding it. And if God exists, then for a creature to reject his Creator, it's the ultimate missed opportunity.

To me, intelligence includes the capability to acknowledge someone's own limitations.

The complete absence of evidence is pretty good as evidence of absence. I consider myself an atheist, and while I accept that I could be wrong, and there's a god who just doesn't feel like showing himself, I don't have any reason to think that's the case. An atheist doesn't discard the supernatural a priori, but accepts that since there wasn't a monster under the bed the last hundred times, odds are pretty good one still won't be there this time.

Akshat, you're conflating lack of religiousness with atheism. Those are separate concepts. It's possible to be non-religious and believe in superstitions, and it's possible to be an evangelical atheist.

The modern version of Pascal's Wager is agnosticism. To be perfectly honest, lack of experimental evidence for the supernatural doesn't mean that the supernatural doesn't exist.

As always, the word “correlation” is important. It hasn’t been shown that higher intelligence causes someone to be less religious. So, it wouldn’t be right to call someone a dimwit just because of their religious beliefs. Unless, of course, you are an ancient playwright looking to provoke your audience.

Also, note how it says this study can only be applied to american protestants (more or less). Move the cultural scope and you might get different results. There's dogma in all groups, it's the groups thing.

Although I was raised Catholic I'm not religious, I really only went to church because I liked ancient history. But I have to say I find the conclusion of the meta-analysis of all the studies wrong at least from my perspective.

Mostly because I am going by personal experience a former co-worker, a man I know who was a professor of mathematics, CPA, a very all around smart guy who could easily be top dog at one of the Big Four auditors if he wanted to is a religious man.

I find something powerful and scary when people who are very smart are also religious, I start to question myself if I am I wrong for not going to church.

I mean there is being "Religious" and also "religious", big R is where people expect the sun to literally dance on Easter morning, Jesus' face in objects, honestly believe Jesus (or Allah/Yahweh/Buddha) was white and spoke english and then there are those who are spiritual who just happened to be born into their religion.

Although I was raised Catholic I'm not religious, I really only went to church because I liked ancient history. But I have to say I find the conclusion of the meta-analysis of all the studies wrong at least from my perspective.

Mostly because I am going by personal experience a former co-worker, a man I know who was a professor of mathematics, CPA, a very all around smart guy who could easily be top dog at one of the Big Four auditors if he wanted to is a religious man.

I find something powerful and scary when people who are very smart are also religious, I start to question myself if I am I wrong for not going to church.

I mean there is being "Religious" and also "religious", big R is where people expect the sun to literally dance on Easter morning, Jesus' face in objects, honestly believe Jesus (or Allah/Yahweh/Buddha) was white and spoke english and then there are those who are spiritual who just happened to be born into their religion.

You know that the study only said that taken on average this is the case, not that there are no smart religious people anywhere, right?

If intelligence only means "thinking only in terms of what one can scientifically measure", that kind of thinking excludes the supernatural, and as such, has no chance of finding it. And if God exists, then for a creature to reject his Creator, it's the ultimate missed opportunity.

Absolutely. If materialism is functioning as the underlying worldview then the questions asked of religion will arise from that framework. ie empiricism, reason, historical inquiry etc - all questions that while they get you some of the way, will never *by definition* be able to provide "proof" or satisfactory answers.

If instead one assumes the existence of the supernatural for the sake of the argument, then a new epistemology (way of understanding/acquiring knowledge) becomes available, namely that of divine revelation. Assessing religion, and in fact reality itself, through those glasses (for myself, Christian glasses of the revelation of God in Jesus) at least provides answers that you can then accept or dismiss. You can ask which worldview best makes sense of the reality we find ourselves in.

C.S. Lewis describes it like this: "I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen: not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else."

Akshat, you're conflating lack of religiousness with atheism. Those are separate concepts. It's possible to be non-religious and believe in superstitions, and it's possible to be an evangelical atheist.

The modern version of Pascal's Wager is agnosticism. To be perfectly honest, lack of experimental evidence for the supernatural doesn't mean that the supernatural doesn't exist.

But that could be said about lots of things, including flying Twinkies.

If intelligence only means "thinking only in terms of what one can scientifically measure", that kind of thinking excludes the supernatural, and as such, has no chance of finding it. And if God exists, then for a creature to reject his Creator, it's the ultimate missed opportunity.

Absolutely. If materialism is functioning as the underlying worldview then the questions asked of religion will arise from that framework. ie empiricism, reason, historical inquiry etc - all questions that while they get you some of the way, will never *by definition* be able to provide "proof" or satisfactory answers.

If instead one assumes the existence of the supernatural for the sake of the argument, then a new epistemology (way of understanding/acquiring knowledge) becomes available, namely that of divine revelation. Assessing religion, and in fact reality itself, through those glasses (for myself, Christian glasses of the revelation of God in Jesus) at least provides answers that you can then accept or dismiss. You can ask which worldview best makes sense of the reality we find ourselves in.

C.S. Lewis describes it like this: "I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen: not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else."

"I believe in god, I find evidence of his existence everywhere I assume it to be."

Oh boy. Another religion vs non-religion thread in 3...2...1...mark! When are both sides going to tire of wailing on each other?

If it manages to make different religions stop wailing on each other for a few seconds I'd consider that a major victory.

Do you mean "waling on one another", which is the "traditional" phrase, which means to raise welts on one another? (edit: or "whaling" -to thrash or beat soundly) Of course, while "to wail on each other" doesn't really seem like a good grammatical form, it does seem rather descriptive of the process of theists and atheists interacting in comments sections.

There are so many caveats with this study (which is, in any case, only a reheating of previously published studies) that I'm not sure why Ars is turning this into news.

Is Ars now just going for clickbait, like HuffPo?

meta analyses aren't just reheats. They are very effective at adding credibility to previous studies or discrediting them as well. Basically if someone else laid the foundation for a study there's no need for the new guy to do it again. If its solid then build on it. Meta analyses are also looked at as credible, no one discounts them for what they are, only for how they're done. This one was done right.

People who are intelligent enough don't discard the supernatural "a priori" (i.e. before they even begin).

The ultimate problem with atheism is, how does someone prove that something or somebody (here, God) doesn't exist? Maybe they just haven't been looking at the right places. Maybe they have met God, but they didn't recognize him.

If intelligence only means "people who think only in terms of what they can scientifically measure", that kind of thinking excludes the supernatural, and as such, has no chance of finding it. And if God exists, then for a creature to reject his Creator, it's the ultimate missed opportunity.

To me, intelligence includes the capability to acknowledge someone's own limitations.

The complete absence of evidence is pretty good as evidence of absence. I consider myself an atheist, and while I accept that I could be wrong, and there's a god who just doesn't feel like showing himself, I don't have any reason to think that's the case. An atheist doesn't discard the supernatural a priori, but accepts that since there wasn't a monster under the bed the last hundred times, odds are pretty good one still won't be there this time.

Technically you can't prove a negative. So you can't prove God doesn't exist.

There are many things that are probable but highly unlikely. For instance all the air molecules in the room might suddenly decide to move to one corner and I would suffocate.

But I rest soundly at night knowing it is extremely unlikely that God exists nor will the air molecules abandon me.

I think Lewis is saying that not only does he find the evidence for Christianity itself compelling, but that by adopting a Christian worldview everything else makes much more sense as well.

Ok... but he says he can see the sun. At best (I assume) he imagines what God may be like then assigns particular deeds to him. Deeds that incidentally generally have perfectly good natural explanations.

If it manages to make different religions stop wailing on each other for a few seconds I'd consider that a major victory.

Agreed.

I've long been put-off by people expecting me to be "Christian" - just because I was born in a predominately Christian country - when said "Christians" can't even agree among themselves what the details of their professed religions are... any more than Muslims, Jews, or any other religion I've heard about can agree on the details of their own religions.

Religon = dogma = not question = lack of intelligence. It's in the very definition.

To quote Euripides:"We have no use for theological subtleties.The beliefs we have inherited, as old as time, cannot be overthrown by any argument, not by the most inventive ingenuity"(Bacchae, ll.201-3)

People who are intelligent enough don't discard the supernatural "a priori" (i.e. before they even begin).

If you can't measure it and predict it then it is unreal enough to be irrelevant regardless of how real it is.

The problem with religion is that you never know if yours is any more valid than the next one. You have no real way to evaluate competiting options. At best you have some sort of fascist dictactor threatinging some cruel and unusual punishment for non-compliance.

People who are intelligent enough don't discard the supernatural "a priori" (i.e. before they even begin).

If you can't measure it and predict it then it is unreal enough to be irrelevant regardless of how real it is.

The problem with religion is that you never know if yours is any more valid than the next one. You have no real way to evaluate competiting options. At best you have some sort of fascist dictactor threatinging some cruel and unusual punishment for non-compliance.

oo oo oo I can predict something that I am totally POSITIVE will happen! Judgement day.

Lets just wait until then to see if I am right,

sounds good to me! (it doesnt sound irrelevant at all, in light of it perhaps being true)

People who are intelligent enough don't discard the supernatural "a priori" (i.e. before they even begin).

If you can't measure it and predict it then it is unreal enough to be irrelevant regardless of how real it is.

The problem with religion is that you never know if yours is any more valid than the next one. You have no real way to evaluate competiting options. At best you have some sort of fascist dictactor threatinging some cruel and unusual punishment for non-compliance.

I think you mean a fascist dictator who's representatives threaten (and sometimes execute) cruel and unusual punishment for non-compliance... often while emptying the pocketbooks of those they threaten.